Maintenance · Reference
How a decorative surface looks after ten years is decided mostly by sealing — the product, when it first went on, how often it is renewed and how the surface is cleaned in between. None of that is difficult, and almost all of the damaged surfaces we are asked to repair were damaged by one of five avoidable things.
Detail
A sealer on decorative concrete does three jobs: it saturates and protects the colour, it stops liquids soaking into a porous surface and staining it, and it reduces the water in the top few millimetres that would otherwise freeze and spall the surface. It is not a wear layer and it is not permanent. Treating it as maintenance rather than as a one-off part of the installation is the single biggest factor in how a decorative surface looks after ten years.
Film-forming sealers sit on the surface, give the wet look people associate with decorative concrete, and need reapplying more often. Penetrating sealers soak in, change the appearance far less, and last longer. Neither is correct in general. A stamped patio where the client wants colour depth is a film-forming job with grit added. A large exposed-aggregate driveway is usually better served by a penetrating product. We name the specific product in the quote rather than writing sealed.
As a working guide for the Charlotte region: two to three years for exterior film-forming sealers on a patio or walk, sooner around a saltwater pool, three to five years for penetrating sealers, and longer for covered surfaces out of direct sun. The tell that a surface is due is that water stops beading and starts darkening the concrete where it lands.
Most bad resealing jobs are cleaning failures. Sealer applied over dirt, algae or a previous degraded coat will cloud, peel or trap what is underneath. The surface has to be cleaned, any failed sealer removed, and the concrete allowed to dry completely — which after a wash means days, not hours. Where a previous coat has gone milky, it must be stripped rather than covered.
Do not use de-icing salt on it, particularly in the first winter — it accelerates surface scaling and will strip a sealer. Do not pressure wash at close range on a high setting, which erodes the surface and the antiquing colour with it. Do not use acidic or solvent-based cleaners on a sealed finish. Do not leave planters sitting directly on a coloured slab. Almost every damaged decorative surface we are asked to repair was damaged by one of those five things.
If a surface is spalling, if the colour has worn through in traffic paths, or if the sealer has failed repeatedly in the same places, resealing will not fix it and will usually make it look worse. Those are symptoms of a surface problem underneath — a poor original cure, a slab that stays wet, or a colouring method that was only ever skin deep. The honest answer in that case is an overlay or a replacement, and we would rather say so than sell a sealing job that fails again in a year.
Site visits are free, and we will say plainly when a smaller or cheaper option is the better one.